There's No Such Thing as TMI

August 26, 2014 5:14 PM

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My wife and I took the genetic tests. When the doctor told us we were in the clear, there was a measurable sense of relief. We knew there was a risk, since both of us are Jews of Eastern European ancestry. Twenty-five percent of Ashkenazi Jews, after all, are carriers of at least one of 19 different Jewish genetic diseases (J Community Genet (2014) 5: 223-231). We didn't have to worry about that, though. We were "all good."

Three months after our beautiful daughter, Eden, was born, we got a feeling -- call it parents' intuition. She was far behind other babies her age in terms of growth and muscle tone. At around 9 months old, we turned to physical therapy to help her sit up and surgeries to correct her crossed eyes. T...